Once Upon a Shifter (8 page)

The brown bear raised his head and stared at Connor as he chewed a long cucumber still in the plastic wrapping. The bear’s big brown eyes watched him with a peaceful serenity.

Connor’s pulse sped up as he gritted his teeth together. He stepped towards the bear and ripped the cucumber out of his mouth and slapped him over the head with it. The bear winced and stepped back with his head lowered.

Sidney postured up and pointed at the ground. “Watch out for the…” The bear stepped on the milk carton with his back paw and it exploded under his weight. Milk sprayed the kitchen cupboards and coated the bear’s hind legs.

“Ah damn it,” Sidney cursed under his breath. He slumped back down on the chair and shoveled another spoonful of cereal into his big mouth.

Connor raised the half eaten cucumber over his head. “Phase now Edwin or I’ll hit you harder.”

The bear stepped back and looked at him like he was unsure of what to do next. He slowly lowered his mouth and picked up a head of cabbage, never breaking eye contact with Connor. He chewed it slowly.

Connor threw the cucumber onto the messy floor and reached behind the counter to the frying pan hanging on the wall. He squeezed the handle and raised it over his head.

The bear opened his mouth and dropped the cabbage onto the floor. His face contorted in pain as his body folded in on itself. The long brown hairs receded back into his body as the big, hulky bear shrunk and turned pink. His long snout retracted in on itself and his massive head shrank and rounded out.

Connor placed the frying pan back on the hook over the counter. When he turned around Edwin was lying on the ground naked. Edwin sat up and looked around at the mess on the floor. He picked up an open jar of peanut butter off the ground, stuck his finger in it and then licked his finger clean.

“The girls are supposed to be here in a few hours!” Connor yelled.

Edwin looked up at him with his eyebrows raised. He scooped his finger back in the peanut butter jar and shoved it into his mouth.

Connor exhaled and shook his head. He watched his two employees with slumped shoulders. “Can you guys just pretend to care?”

“What girls?” Sidney asked. “Are they hot?”

Connor’s bear grumbled inside him.
This is not the time.

“It doesn’t matter,” Connor said, reaching over and picking up a broken jar of pickles. “They’re clients and we’ll treat them with the respect that they deserve.”

“Are they going to mate with us?” Edwin asked.

“No,” Connor said, ripping the peanut butter jar out of his hands. “You’re going to teach them how to kayak and that is all.”

Connor shook his head and watched Edwin. The fit, muscular werebear sat on the fridge and looked around at the mess on the floor for something else to eat.
What was I thinking when I hired this guy?
But Connor hadn’t really had a choice. He needed to hire werebears to work with him and these two jokers were the only ones that he could find. He had to phase into his bear form from time to time and he couldn’t be doing that with regular people around.

Edwin was a very interesting case. His parents were both humans who gave birth to a werebear shifter. It was extremely rare for two humans to give birth to a shifter but it did happen on occasion. When Edwin was ten he changed into a brown bear in their living room. His super religious parents thought that he was possessed by the devil and ran out of the room screaming. His dad returned with a shotgun and Edwin’s bear was sitting down on the carpet, eating the arm of the sofa.

Unfortunately for Connor, his father didn’t shoot him. With the barrel of his shotgun he guided Edwin into the back of his pickup truck and drove the bear into the mountains, deep into the forest. Edwin had spent the rest of his youth and all of his teenage years and early twenties as a bear.

Connor found him a few months ago in his bear form eating out of a garbage bin behind a restaurant. He took him in and offered him a job as a kayaking instructor. Edwin was good with a paddle but he wasn’t very comfortable in his human skin. He was unsure of how to talk and act in social situations and he was constantly changing back into his bear at the most inappropriate times. It wasn’t very good for business.

“Can you guys help me?” Connor asked, as he picked up an apple by his feet.

“Are you going to eat that?” Sidney asked.

Connor whipped the apple at him and Sidney plucked it out of the air with his hand. “Thanks boss,” he said as he bit into the apple with a crunch.

“I was aiming for your head,” Connor muttered. Sidney’s big head lit up in a smile.

Sidney was a polar bear who had applied for a job. He was a former defensive tackle in the NFL who was unemployed after he got banned from the league. He played a total of two games on the Chicago Bears. In those two games he had a total of six interceptions, eighteen sacks, nine forced fumbles and fifteen touchdowns.

He had a very promising future ahead of him until he got tested for performance enhancing drugs. His testosterone level was nineteen times over the legal limit. The doctor was shocked that Sidney was still alive but those were normal levels for a polar bear. And for a werebear.

Connor was a huge Chicago fan but he quickly realized that although Sidney was a skilled athlete, he couldn’t kayak for shit.

Connor pushed Edwin to the side and lifted up the fridge. He picked up and slid the see-through, plastic drawer back into the slot.

“This excursion is important for the business,” he said. “These girls won this trip off of the biggest radio station in New York City. If it goes well the station agreed to buy, advertise and give away a trip a week.” That would be amazing for his company. He could bring Brooke Excursions to the next level. He could surpass the number two, Sunshine Kayaking, and then it would only be a matter of time before he would be on the heels of the number one spot.

He picked up a broken jar of salad dressing and tossed it into the garbage. “Just don’t embarrass me.”

Edwin stood up, naked, with mustard dripping from his penis. “We wouldn’t do that to you boss.”

two

“Miss Sanderson,” the doorman said, looking straight ahead with his white-gloved hand tucked behind his back. “Miss Hawkins.”

“Hi Alfred,” Rebecca said, leaning down to see him out of the passenger window of her car. “We’re here to pick up Grace.”

“She is on her way,” he said in his thick British accent. Grace had told them once that Alfred was actually from San Diego and the accent was all a show and that he had even bought a fake British passport to convince everyone that he was from Manchester. He even looked British. He was an older man with gray hair and a thin, jet black mustache. His tuxedo was always perfect. He never had a single crease or crumple.

Angie winked at Rebecca from the passenger seat. “Hey Alfred,” she said. “Did you see the San Diego Padres play the Braves last night? They really suck this season.”

Alfred’s eyes went wide and he clenched his jaw. “I don’t know what you’re talking about Miss Hawkins.” He looked past them over Rebecca’s car.

“Yeah,” Angie continued. “The Padres’ pitching is atrocious this season. And their batting is the worst in the league.”

Alfred’s neck was turning red over his crisp, white collar. “I don’t know what you’re talking about Miss Hawkins but I will say that the Padres pitching is probably full of rookies that are going to develop over time into the best bullpen in the league. And the batting slump is probably just temporary.”

“It sounds like you’re a fan,” Angie said, looking out the car at the sweating man.

“No, no, no,” he said, thickening his British accent. “I only watch cricket and
foot
ball.”

Grace came bounding through the twelve foot high double doors of her family’s mansion. She wore heels and a tight gold dress that showed off her slender thighs. Her blond hair was tied up behind her head with a diamond encrusted barrette holding it up into a bun. A second butler followed her out rolling her large suitcase.

Rebecca popped the trunk as Grace got into the back seat.

“We’re only going for a weekend,” Angie said, as the butler struggled to lift Grace’s heavy bag down the steps.

“Yes but there’s breakfastwear, afternoonwear, hikingwear, eveningwear, dinnerwear and pajamas.” She leaned forward between the seats and checked her reflection in the rear view mirror. She slid her finger over her eyebrow.

“Hello ladies,” Grace’s dad said, walking down the steps to Rebecca’s car.

“Hi Senator Briggs,” Rebecca and Angie said together.

He smiled, his perfect, politician smile. “You two are grown ups now,” he said. “You can call me Richard. Senator Richard.”

“Okay bye Dad,” Grace said. She leaned forward and whispered in Rebecca’s ear. “Just go.”

Rebecca slid the car into drive and pulled away from the curb. She drove past the perfectly manicured bushes on both sides of the long driveway towards the steel iron gate. The two security guards in the booth opened the gate and waved to them as they passed. Rebecca always felt so stupid driving her used, ten year old car through these gates. Just the electronic gate alone cost more than she’d probably make in her life as a kindergarten teacher.

“So remind me again why we’re going canoing in the forest,” Grace said from the back seat.

“It’s kayaking first of all,” Rebecca said, pulling onto the road. There were multi-million dollar mansions everywhere she looked. “And you’re doing this because you owe me. You’ve dragged me to enough charity dinners over the years that I think you can give me one weekend.”

Grace organized the fanciest charity dinners in New York for the cities’ wealthiest elite. They were full of people bragging about what they had and comparing their expensive toys and Grace was always dragging Rebecca to them.

“Fine, but why kayaking?” she whined. “Let’s take my Dad’s jet and go to Ibiza for the weekend.”

“No we got the trip set up already,” Rebecca said. “We’re going in the mountains.” Rebecca always found the forest and mountains to be so peaceful. So serene. It was definitely what she needed after the rough couple of weeks that she had.

“There’s no place to take your mind off of Mark like Ibiza,” Grace pushed. “Some sweaty, muscular, Italian guy pushing up against you on the dance floor will make you forget Mark ever existed.”

“We’re going kayaking,” Rebecca insisted. “I already got the tickets.”

“Off of a radio station contest,” Grace said. “Yuck.”

Rebecca turned to Angie. “Help me out here.” Angie had her bare feet up on the dashboard, flipping through an old book of CDs.

“I don’t know,” Angie said, “Ibiza sounds pretty nice.”

“Thank you,” Grace said from the back, slapping the seat.

“But I do have to get back to the lab Monday morning,” Angie said, her face lighting up. “We have a Graphene Quantum Dots Accelerator on loan from Japan and we’re close to wrapping up our experiment for breaking the band gap energy flow.”

“See?” Rebecca said, looking in the rear view mirror at Grace who was in the back seat with her arms crossed and pouting. “Angie has to get back Monday morning to her evil, super villain lab to take over the world.”

“Oh shit,” Angie said, pulling out a CD. She slid it into the CD player and looked at Rebecca with a smile. “What does this remind you of?”

An old familiar song came on through the speakers. “Oh shit!” Grace yelled. “Prom!”

“Oh Justin,” Rebecca said, as she recognized it as N’Sync’s
Bye Bye Bye
.

“Lance all the way baby,” Angie said, holding her arms to her chest.

The first verse started and the three best friends sang at the top of their lungs. This was just what Rebecca needed. A weekend with her girls to take her mind off of Mark. She had been waiting by the phone waiting for him to call all week, even after the shit he put her through. She still would’ve taken him back and she was just waiting around for the opportunity.

She sped down the road, leaving the mansions in the background, singing with the first love of her life. Justin.

three

“So remember what I told you guys about professionalism,” Connor said to the two werebears sitting in front of him. The girls would be here any minute and he didn’t want them messing things up.

“Why are you looking at me?” Sidney asked, putting his hand to his chest. “I’m not the one that phases and eats all of the food.”

“Yeah but you’re the one that offers our guests autographs for ten dollars a piece.”

“That’s a deal,” Sidney said, with a look of outrage. “You don’t understand. You’ve never been a celebrity.”

“Either have you,” Connor said. “You played two NFL games and got kicked out of the league. If you’re famous for anything it’s being the player who had the shortest career ever.”

Edwin laughed and smacked Sidney’s shoulder.

“And you,” Connor said, turning on him. “Can you please stay in your human form for forty eight hours? That’s all I’m asking. I know it’s hard for you but these are city girls. They won’t know what a werebear is and I really don’t feel like explaining it to them as they’re running away screaming.”

Edwin nodded while he scratched himself inappropriately.

Connor stepped forward and pulled his arm away. “Remember what I taught you about the scratching?”

Connor exhaled. How could he have thought that hiring a feral werebear was a good idea? He should have asked some of his cousins from the Hudson Crew in Montana if they had wanted a job. Ellis or Finch would’ve been great. Even Keene or Quint would’ve been better than these two jokers.

Sidney turned to Edwin. “If you have to change to a bear just go behind the cabin and phase. I’ll distract the girls for you.”

“No, no, no,” Connor said, waving his hands. “There’s no phasing. And that’s all there is to it.”

Edwin nodded his head. “I won’t let you down boss.”

The crunching sound of tires on gravel came in from outside. Connor took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Alright, they’re here.” He walked to the window and peered through the curtains.